Art in the Expanded Field: In Conversation with Tianlan Deng

“We live in a globalized world now, and I believe this perspective is crucial for career development.”

Mixed-media artist and architectural designer Tianlan Deng goes above and beyond when approaching new projects, in both scale and concept. Fearless in probing existing boundaries, Deng draws from his multitudinous skill set, educational background and knowledge of world cultures to bring award-winning concepts to the table for his design projects. Deng has experience working internationally as an architectural designer, professor, and thought leader in design. We became aware of Deng’s most recent proposal, which also caught the eye of the Rockaway Park High School for Environmental Sustainability-Beach Channel Educational Campus. Deng’s vision for a bright, revitalized campus blighted by insufficient budgeting and oversight has generally enthused both the educational community benefiting from the project and our team here at ANTE.

Deng himself is thrilled for the positive impact this project will enact on the wider NYC community at large, and the potential it has to serve as a role model for other campuses seeking to engage students at a visceral level. We sat down with Deng to dive into his background and to gain some perspective on what this exciting project means for his career and for the community at Rockaway Park High School.

(Lead image concept, “Live Learning” by Tianlan Deng for Rockaway Park High School Beach Channel Educational Campus Auditorium re-visioning)

ANTE. Thanks for chatting with us Tianlan! Can you start by giving us insight into how you envision your architectural project with Rockaway Park High School will optimize and revitalize this educational community and enhance students’ learning experience?

Tianlan Deng. Thanks for having me here. As you probably know, in New York City, many public schools situated in low-income neighborhoods often face challenges of low funding support and safety concerns. Consequently, these schools feel like a prison, and they often fall into a financial down cycle: poor learning environment, lower graduation rate, dwindling student population, limited finances — leading to the school eventually being shut down. My project “Live Learning” aims to ease the prison-like atmosphere in the school, improving the students’ educational experience and overall quality of life. This will boost the school’s future prospects for securing funding and recruitment.

The struggle of these underfunded public schools is a long-term result of educational inequality in the United States. To remedy this situation, we cannot depend solely upon systemic policy reform, which often falls prey to cumbersome approval processes as well as broader political interests. However, as a discipline, architecture and interior design can be a highly effective alternative tool, because it offers technical & creative solutions without the politics. By adopting a temporary art installation and projected (digital) media, I believe this project can foster a comfortable and uplifting environment, inciting curiosity, passion, and hope in the student body.

Alternative concept image, “Live Learning” by Tianlan Deng for Rockaway Park High School Beach Channel Educational Campus

ANTE. You approached this project as your thesis for your Master’s degree at Pratt Institute. Can you discuss the program you recently completed at Pratt and what specifically this project addressed with regard to your aims for that educational program?

TD. It encourages the students to develop a sense of social responsibility. Before entering school, my artwork mostly dealt with the issues in the education realm. Enhanced by Pratt’s ideology, I became more involved in these conversations. Meanwhile, Pratt’s open and skillful platform helped me expand my artistic practice into the realm of architectural and interior design. Consistently, the thesis program at Pratt strongly emphasizes social and environmental issues. Since education always factors into larger socio-economic issues, I discovered an opportunity to develop a long term design project in my new discipline.

The parallel of being a designer for a Public High School and a student at Pratt provides a great reference point for my research and development. Although the differences between a college and a high school are substantial, I still can gather plenty of information by comparison. At Pratt, we have free access to most of the high profile museums in NYC, while the students of underfunded schools may never visit museums during their lifetimes. We use advanced digital fabrication equipment at Pratt, while some public schools use textbooks that are in shambles. From that angle, I witness the vast disparity between the two poles of America’s education system. These vivid contrasts shape and grow my design intention and responsibility.

ANTE. Your career goals seem to intersect both progressive education and experimental architectural/spatial design: what about these dual concerns draw you to working on projects such as this upcoming project with the high school?

TD. My belief in progressive education is rooted in my personal experience. For 20 years, I was suffering from studying under a Chinese education dominated by tests and mechanical learning. In those monotonous Chinese classrooms, teachers force-feed students information while students learn by rote memorization. (The monotonous process along with endless pressure from exams shaped the Chinese school into a symbol of anguish and torture.) After studying in the USA, I was lucky enough to experience progressive learning, which emphasizes growth from real life experience. This is what allowed me to develop my personality, philosophies, and systems of knowledge.

However, I realized that Rockaway Park High School and other underfunded NYC public schools follow the same pattern as the Chinese one. I understand it as a result of limited funding and resources, but in the long term, mechanical learning reduces the quality of the educational experience, which doesn’t benefit the school system or lower-income students. I believe with a modest budget, Experimental Design with technology can shape the public school teaching into a more progressive education system. Creating temporal and flexible structures with projected media can alter perceptions about the educational experience, prompting closer associations with experimental learning rather than behavior-based models. Structured to achieve an open, airy feel, the installation aims to excite and re-energize students, opening up their minds to new possibilities. The flexibility it provides will dissolve the traditional learning model and enhance the public education experience. Like Governor Andrew Cuomo mentioned in one of his coronavirus daily briefings: “When we’re reopening schools, let’s open a better school, and let’s open a smarter education system.” I hope my project “Live Learning” for Rockaway Park High School will create an opportunity for underfunded public schools to re-imagine education.

Alternative concept image, “Live Learning” by Tianlan Deng for Rockaway Park High School Beach Channel Educational Campus

ANTE. Talk to me about site-specific aspects of this environmental and architectural design project at Rockaway Park HS; how did meeting with the community inform your process as you finalized this proposal?

TD. Before the pandemic, I visited the school and spoke with the administrative staff and students several times. Rockaway Park High School is located at the Beach Channel Educational Campus, which is shared by several other schools. Like many underfunded public schools, Beach Channel Campus has a prison-like atmosphere, defined primarily by the dense security technology and numerous security officers. During our conversations, students told stories of the long security check process. The administrative staff mentioned that conflicts between officers and students were a regular occurrence. I factored these considerations into my design for the entrance of the Beach Channel Educational Campus. I conceptualized new stanchions with increased mobility, and they serve as both partitions to curb the traffic flow, and projection screens for multimedia displays. This will channel a better circulation during the security check, while presenting pleasant visual distractions to ease the atmosphere, and offering more privacy for students during the checking process.

After several visits to the campus, I found many empty spaces in this massive building, including a wide corridor and an extra auditorium with a low usage level. These spaces are wasted resources due to the lack of funding and inefficient spatial recognition. I proposed creating additional temporary installations with digital projections to activate these spaces, converting them into new common areas for students and/or alternative learning spaces. These installations can also become an open platform for the administration to stage temporary events for community-building and school wide activities.

Alternative concept image, “Live Learning” by Tianlan Deng for Rockaway Park High School Beach Channel Educational Campus

ANTE. You yourself have worked as an educator, as you were a professor at the University of Kentucky. How did your own role as an educator working with college students inform your design process as relates to education?

TD. My personal experience of switching between student and instructor has a significant influence on my design process. It helped me develop strong empathy during the design process. I have a deeper understanding of both the learning and educational process, and am acutely aware of the challenges, struggles, and problems facing schools today. For example as a student, I remember my own struggle of enduring monotonous lessons in a lifeless classroom. On the other hand as a teacher, I know the difficulties of motivating students and maintaining their focus. This insight inspired my decision to use projected media, which has great flexibility, or presentation format. With various projected media content and forms to interact with students, the installation can enhance the environment while offering additional ways for teachers to communicate and keep students stimulated.

ANTE. You have studied in China, Japan, Denmark, and the United States. Can you elaborate on how these international experiences have shaped your career?

TD. Studying and living in both East and Western countries increased my sensitivity toward social issues, including education. The chance to observe and compare people, systems and cultural norms revealed the differences and difficulties of each society. Being an artist and designer, my career goals, choices, and expectations have become increasingly interrelated with societal issues. Studying and living between China and the United States made me aware of the differences and similarities between the two educational systems. It informs my intention to produce artwork that communicates my wishes and concerns. Traveling to Japan and Northern Europe broadened my spectrum of global education and expanded my knowledge of design’s power. My project “Life Learning” at Rockaway Park High School is a choice shaped by all my international experience. We live in a globalized world now, and I believe this perspective is crucial for career development.

ANTE. Walk us through the career highlights that have marked your exceptional rise as an architectural designer – including your award winning commissions for the Gatton College of Business and Economics in KY (2016) and more recently the Best Team of Wanted Design Competition (2019.) What about your practice, do you feel, leads to your continued success and recognition in the field?

TD. When I primarily focused on painting, my paintings were collected by several well-known hotels in China, such as Fairmont Pace Hotel in Shanghai and Tianjin Crowne Plaza. After coming to the states, I became more involved with installation art. I completed small commissions for site-specific installations, such as the ‘Fence’ I created for the Lyric Theatre & Cultural Arts Center — a translucent photo wall that cyclically sculpts sunlight and shadow to create a sensory experience. Winning the glass design competition of Gatton College of Business and Economics was important to me. The project ‘Tally Mark’ is not only an award-winning achievement, but a successful example of how fine art and spatial architectural design can be combined. Tally Mark is an art installation that introduces the ancient Asian counting system into a western financial college. It establishes a diverse cultural atmosphere while serving as a spatial partition to maintain the independence of both private and communal spaces. 

Tally Mark inspired me to continue exploring projects that combine fine art and architectural design. Three years later, I participated in the Wanted Design competition following a similar trajectory. Five designers from different countries spent five days creating a community engagement project. My project ‘This is Not Stair’ is a site-specific installation that alters the walk route to bring enjoyment and engagement to the monotonous pavement walking experience. This project won the competition and was featured in Core77 Magazine.

I wouldn’t say there is one specific aspect of my artistic practice that leads to success or recognition. But maintaining a sense of connection to the world and society is fundamental to my creative process.

 

– ANTE mag

Wavelength Interview for 10xCommunity: “We Are Really in the Moment”

ANTE mag is focusing on ten projects that span creative disciplines and seek to build wider community ties between creative disciplines in our new series of interviews 10xCommunity. Featuring artistic projects, community-building initiatives and interdisciplinary platforms, ANTE is sharing these interviews on the mag and across social media that spotlight these endeavors through the current social crisis to pivot to sharing positivity and uplifting creative news to our audience. Wavelength was founded in 2015 by Gianluca Bianchino and Jeanne Brasile and serves as a catalyst in the growing conversation between art and science. We touched base with the two curators to learn more about their “Pandemic Projections” initiative in the wake of CoVid-19.

 

(Cover image: Alessandro Brighetti, “Smokeocene” image courtesy the artist and Wavelength Art)

Matt Sheridan, “Castles Made of Sand” produced by Tove Langridge with the participation of Queensland Ballet dancers Jack Lister (choreography) with Clare Morehen and Eleanor Freeman, cinematography by Greg Henderson, painting-in-motion animation and composite edit by Matt Sheridan – image courtesy the artist and Wavelength Art.

ANTE mag. For 10xCommunity, ANTE is specifically featuring projects that somehow respond or have shifted in relation to Pandemic Projections – can you share with us how this initiative began and what it was started to address/achieve?

Gianluca Bianchino.  The project began somewhat serendipitously and with modest intentions.  Back in early April, Jeanne, who’s an active curator and gallery director, was compelled to project ambient video of a coral reef onto the 70 foot wide façade of a commercial building across the street from her home. It was merely play by a restless curator without a physical space due to the pandemic. The effect she was hoping to achieve was the transformation of the building into a large aquarium in the middle of a mostly quiet residential neighborhood for the purpose of activating an unusual space for a night or two. She shared an image of her projection with me.  At first I thought it was a good thing to do and there was something visually striking about it.  It seemed to be the perfect time for experimenting anyway.  All alone in my studio in Newark, New Jersey, I enjoyed the result but I didn’t think much of it that night other than the playfulness. In those days, in the midst of all the negative news we were receiving at an alarming rate, I was thinking about my mother in Italy, who’s elderly and living alone in the country hardest hit at that time by the pandemic, and the daunting prospect that the wave was coming our way.  It was disconcerting to know the only help I could lend to her, my family, and my friends in the old world, was a phone call. Suddenly, through social media I saw something really amazing taking place on the balconies of Italian cities, particularly in the south, where ancient forms of folk music have been experiencing revitalization over the past two decades. People were mostly playing hand drums, known as Tammorra, across balconies creating synchronized, spontaneous music. These were real world creative acts that allowed communication – without disrupting social distancing guidelines.  It occurred to me that there was an opportunity with video projection in the real world, and with the assistance of social media, to generate a similar experience here. I proposed to Jeanne a program featuring projections by different artists. The thought had probably already crossed her mind and it instantly became an opportunity for our ongoing curatorial collaboration, Wavelength, to explore curating on the fringes of the art world.  

Jeanne Brasile.  Once the project developed more clearly in our minds, I realized that presenting the screenings on social media via live streaming would exploit the more positive aspects of the platforms. It was also crucial that the tools we needed to present these video screenings publicly, and to a wide audience, were built into the functionality of both Facebook and Instagram. I like the idea of using social media as a curatorial and artistic stage to bring artists, curators and audiences together in a meaningful way that is interactive – like a virtual happening. The participatory aspect of this format is where I discovered the most value in terms of a creative response to social distancing and the isolation I and others felt during this time. There was a need which we addressed with a rapid response in a fun and experimental, yet critical manner that brought people together.  #pandemicprojections is an outgrowth of my interests and experience curating social interventions which I have been doing on and off for roughly 10 years. I was also thinking about space as a curatorial medium and was intrigued by the challenges and potentiality of curating projected digital video, cast onto a built environment in a social media setting.

ANTE mag. What about the projected image compelled you to begin featuring artworks in this format?

GB. A few days later I was personally onsite when we ran a second test projection using one of my own video works, Momento, which features flocks of starlings.  The realization at that moment was that video art would not only look stunning on the building façade, but it could even have the capacity to obliterate the flatness of the wall with an experience of deep space, as if the whole building was now merely the container for immersive virtual dioramas.  There was something metaphysical about the effect and it was confirmed when we started projecting videos from various artists, some of which exhibited landscape features such as horizon lines and perspective. We began documenting the projections from slightly elevated vantage points. The results were always beautiful and surprising. In the case of Alessandro Brighetti’s Smokeoscene it is especially astounding how his image of perspectival plumes of smoke mirrored the dramatic sunset taking place right above the building. 

JB.  Yes, I definitely thought about the idea of the building as a container, which we discussed at length. I was also interested in creating an alternative to a physical exhibition, which was not possible during this time, and bringing art into a more public sphere, both physically and virtually. I like the idea of democratizing the art experience and the attendant potential for unscripted possibilities – with neighbors, the local police department who came by to view the work one evening, and drivers who stopped their cars and treated the street like an impromptu drive-in theatre. I like that our audience participates in a variety of ways that are self-determined and meaningful to them by virtue of their type of participation – whether in the real world or on social media. We’ve had people anticipating the screenings, joining us each time, others happened upon the events by chance. I also really enjoy the way many of the videos interact with the architectural features of the building, which would never be possible or acceptable, in a traditional gallery environment. Many videos take on new meaning in an out-of-doors setting as well as the context of being shown during the pandemic. One of the most unanticipated aspects for me was how the messaging functions on Facebook and Instagram were embraced by our audience members immediately, who built a community by showing up weekly, asking questions of me, Gianluca and the artists, and who began conversing among themselves during the events and beyond. This is extremely gratifying. I feel we have accomplished our goal to overcome social distancing and bring people together.  It all depended on our audience to make it happen and they oblige, very enthusiastically. 

ANTE mag. How have you found the artists for these projections? 

GB. We began with Jeanne’s idea of reaching out to Kati Vilim, a colleague and friend of ours who we have worked with numerous times. Kati is a geometric abstract painter also working in video and installation. She is also very open to experimentation, so we knew we could rely on her to kick off the series. On the first night of #pandemicprojections we featured a 16 minute video loop of Kati’s images which were generated by an algorithm.  Her work is a fine combination of three-dimensional illusion and flatness. Both these aspects worked great and gave us a sense of the contrast needed in any given video to achieve a satisfactory result. At that point we felt we had enough material to begin properly advertising the program on social media as well as emailing a selection of artists we knew personally whose work might be a good fit. Still, despite the enthusiasm, realistically we thought we might have one or two nights of projections overall.  The response from both our invited artists and open call has been exciting and steady. We are now going on ten iterations, with an average of four featured artists per night. 

JB. We also got lots of referrals from artists on social media, artists that showed their work in #pandemicprojections and a few of my curator friends gave us some leads as well. 

ANTE mag. What type of demand for art do you see this project addressing? 

JB. I see many important needs addressed by #pandemicprojections. First is the need to continue curating and developing exhibitions in a time when all shows and activities were unexpectedly ground to a halt. I wanted to create opportunities for artists and the communities I work with, as well as satisfy my need to actively curate. I had to find a way to bring a community together in ‘real time’ like we are able to do in a gallery, an art opening or similar cultural events where people gather. I also have a desire to push the boundaries of curating, and I am always thinking about ways to advocate for artists while serving community. This project concomitantly satisfied these multivalent needs. With the live streaming, it forced me to get out of my comfort zone and become part of the spectacle by ‘performing’ the screenings with our narration and conversations with the artists and audiences, while allowing me to concomitantly extend my curatorial practice into new, experimental formats that I’d already been interested in. Without the narration and participatory components, the screenings would have been a passive experience which would not have, in my estimation, contributed anything and I really wanted to use this time of crisis to as a challenge to create something unique and meaningful for everyone involved.  

GB. Since the pandemic began institutions have had to reimagine their programming. There have been numerous virtual tours of galleries, collections, and studio visits and presentations via video conference, as well initiatives by groups of artists-supporting-artists on social media. These were all really helpful ways to keep the dialog about art moving forward despite the stagnation. I intended to be a spectator and an occasional participant in the online discussion when invited. However, #pandemicprojections presented a timely opportunity to show art in the real world while holding a forum about the work via social media live feeds. For me, there was something suddenly odd about showing art outside the matrix of the internet. I didn’t know if there was an actual demand for it but we were curious to find out.  In order to comply with social distancing guidelines we have discouraged participating artists and audiences to attend the event in person. However, the fact that it is happening in the physical world requires the viewer to fill in the experience. There’s something phenomenological about the aspect of knowing the screenings are taking place while not being able to witness them in person. It reminds me of astronomers studying black holes. They determine their presence not by the hole itself but by the behavior of everything around it.    

Joe Waks, “Renaissance Américaine,” image courtesy the artist and Wavelength Art.

 

ANTE mag. How do you think the current virus pandemic has affected art production? 

GB. From what I can see through art shared on the internet and discussions I’ve been having with colleagues in the US and abroad, it seems that artists who have had access to their studios, and have been able to float financially one way or another throughout this period, are actually thriving in terms of production, and that has not surprised me. We artists and creative thinkers are for the most part genetically built for this type of seclusion. My impression is that two-dimensional art is really booming at the moment given its natural compatibility with the flat screen from which it is being experienced.  I am curious to see how sculpture will revive itself in the post pandemic era. In a way, I think of #pandemicprojections as a means for creating a three-dimensional experience employing two-dimensional art. If a curator is also an artist in the way they craft an exhibit, then that is the dimension we may have added in bringing all of this work together.

JB. Though artists may have had to adapt due to working at home or losing access to their studios, artists are incredibly resourceful. They will always make art despite creative hardships. I think the real transformation will occur not among artists, but among the sales, consumption and distribution ends of the creative chain. How will galleries, museums, auction houses, collectors and dealers move forward? The idealist in me thinks that perhaps the pandemic will equalize some of the inequities and excesses in the art world. The pragmatic part of my brain argues back that this crisis, like the last economic downturn in 2008, will only further entrench the disparities that exist. I wish I could be more hopeful. 

ANTE mag. As artists, how has this moment affected your own practice?

JB. I was making major progress on my art despite the lack of space since my kitchen was doing triple duty – having been split into a home office, and studio in addition to its usual functions. Fortunately, I have a large kitchen, so it isn’t too chaotic. I finished 2 pieces in the first week or so, and began working on a third. That is a quick pace for me. Once I committed to #pandemicprojections, progress in the studio proper slowed down. That is okay since I am very committed to the project and right now there is more of a need there. People really look forward to the screenings and their social components. Right now, the studio seems insular at a time when I see people craving community. Once we wrap up the screenings, I think I’ll get back some momentum in the studio. I have a lot of pent-up ideas and I’ve been doing lots of day-dreaming, journaling, reading and sketching I can draw from once I get back to art-making.  

GB. I have been an artist for 25 years and I never experienced a creative block. If I were traveling and without a studio for a while, I would make video art.  But I have actually not made much art since the pandemic despite feeling confident about the trajectory I was on with my studio practice. I don’t think of it as a creative block but rather a conscious choice I’ve eased into. And yet, I am lucky to be spending more time in my studio than ever and there are occasional experiments that I undertake. I think #pandemicprojections has occupied my creative space and delivered, so far, great results. What started as play turned quickly into one of the greatest creative responsibilities of my career. And while the curtain is slowly but surely closing on this endeavor we may unveil soon one more final chapter related to this project. 

ANTE mag. How do you see pandemic projections evolving post-CoVid19 pandemic?

GB. Like any creative person experiencing the making of good work, the work itself takes you by the hand and leads you to uncharted territory. Any artists aware of such a seductive lack of control will tell you they can merely nudge the work in a certain direction but the wave that sweeps you is beyond you. #pandemicprojections has been somewhat like that despite the added responsibility of interpreting a collection of works by other artists. We have been recently approached by an arts organization to take the project to a drive-in format for a one night collaborative event in which we’ll aim to feature all the participating artists – while welcoming a physical, albeit socially-distanced, audience. We had a promising meeting and only a set of practical or legal logistics beyond our control could prevent the event from happening at this stage. It would be a fantastic way to conclude our program.  Fingers crossed!  As for the post Covid 19 era it is difficult to say. The project will cease soon and will be reconsidered in the eventuality of a second wave of the pandemic later this year, but for the most part we are really in the moment. 

JB. #pandemicprojections needs to culminate in a public screening which Gianluca mentioned. We’ve created a community and there is a demand to be together in real time and space that cannot be denied. I can’t wait to be able to host a screening with a live audience, showing all the videos in one night. Though we won’t be able to join in a large group, I think the physical proximity and aspects of a ‘drive-in’ format will assuage some of the pent-up longing to be together. I envisioned this to be a finite project from the beginning – meant to address a specific need.  When the world opens up again, the need will presumably no longer be there. Then we’re off to the next project…

Kati Vilim, “Phases” Image courtesy the artist and Wavelength Art.

On Thursday, June 11th, the final installment of Pandemic Projections will be live from 9 pm EST on the Instagram accounts of Jeanne Brasile and Gianluca Bianchino will be hosting this last event, featuring artists:

Angeles Cossio

Eric Valosin

Lori Field

Teresa Braun

Alinta Krauth

and Gianluca Bianchino . Tune in for this last chance to explore intervention art in the tri-state area during the CoVid-19 pandemic.

 

 

About Wavelength

Wavelength is a curatorial collaborative founded in 2015 by Gianluca Bianchino, an artist/curator, and Jeanne Brasile, a curator/artist. Their projects explore the relationship between art and science via immersive exhibitions, interviews with artists/scientists/curators, artists talks, critical writing and symposia.  Wavelength takes part in the growing conversation between art and science, particularly in the realms of physics and astronomy.  Wavelength’s curatorial practice considers phenomenological art informed by scientific principles – concerned more with manifestation than representation.

Interview with Eileen O’Kane Kornreich: “Emotionally Charged Color is My Grammar”

An Interview between Audra Lambert and Eileen O’Kane Kornreich

Our current dual American crises of pandemic outbreak and social inequality are both eerily present in this visceral body of work I encountered by artist Eileen O’Kane Kornreich, “Mortality Path.” The series is open to viewer interpretation as the artist depicts the site of Washington Square Park, a space that has served various functions over the years: a place for organized protest, leisurely strolls, farmland, and a burial ground. Kornreich presents scenes from this locale not with realistic details but charged with facets of the various histories that compose the elements of the site itself.

I first became aware of this series a few months ago, when I met with the artist after encountering her current body of work, “Creatures,” which explores concepts related to the “Gilgamesh” epic. The artist’s powerful dual approaches contrasting the historical realm of Myth against the personal myths we build around our own lives intrigued me, enticing me to learn more about her past body of work. Encountering “Mortality Path,” it became clear that Kornreich invested significant time in researching the purpose of this site throughout New York City’s nearly 400-year history, particularly as it relates to the settlement of Manhattan as it spanned northward from its origins in the current Financial District. The artist charts her engagement with the site from a personal level as someone who frequented the park, diving into its secrets and hidden history in the wake of poignant personal grief she was experiencing during the time period that this series emerged. Kornreich observes rather than comments: she views the psychological aspects of the park’s trajectory, tracing the multi-layered history informing the experience of walking paths along the northwest corner of the park. I sat down with Kornreich for this somber and reflective journey through grief, contemplation, and the intractable pall that past histories indelibly cast on our experience of the present moment.

(Above–>Below) Before Rose, Eileen O’Kane Kornreich (2019) Acrylic, pastel, crayon and pencil on paper, 30×44″ | Her Park Path No Memory, Eileen O’Kane Kornreich (2019) Acrylic, pastel, crayon and pencil on paper, 30×44″

Park Path 7, Eileen O’Kane Kornreich (2019) Acrylic, pastel, crayon and pencil on paper, 30×44″

ANTE mag. Walk us through the origin of “Mortality Path” and your early foray into capturing the vistas of Washington Square Park, how did this space first attract your attention and inspire you to begin work on this series?

Eileen O’Kane Kornreich. After my husband died early 2015, I had been thinking of our mortality and how we humans manipulate the natural world and ritualize our deaths. Death of a beloved brings one down memory lane, and I found myself digging out work from forty years earlier. In the late 1970’s I went through several years of painting landscapes. I was charmed by one oil of the trees out of my studio window. Everything I loved and lived with during those years are dead: the dog, the boyfriend. Everything gone – but not the trees. I drove to see them, still outside that window, the dog buried not more than twenty feet away. I thought of trees and burials, like burials in Indonesia where they inter dead babies in a ritual where they and their spirits are absorbed by nature, which I believe is lovely. I thought of all the markers for our dead, all the bodies moved into catacombs, then I reminded myself of potters’ fields. There are thousands of dumping grounds for human remains; we walk on them daily and are unaware. Washington Square Park’s northwest corner is something I am very aware of and that is so centric to our city and country’s history, yet there are no markers for all those people.

ANTE mag. The theme of this work is site-specific, dwelling on a certain location: The Northwest corner of Washington Square Park. Are you drawn to working with spaces and their layered histories? Why or why not?

EO’KK. This was a first [for me to use a particular site.] This is so specific a site: fifty to two hundred feet of a site. It was not a conscience decision to use a small-scale location. It was a conscience decision to use a mammoth atrocity to over tens of thousands of people, acknowledged. These bodies that were dumped, hidden, ignored, and historically expunged and that one American Elm onsite who saw it all and is still alive. That’s the story.

 

(Above–>Below) See Through to the Piers, Eileen O’Kane Kornreich (2019) Acrylic, pastel, crayon and pencil on paper, 30×44″ | Park Path Dapple Light, Eileen O’Kane Kornreich (2019) Acrylic, pastel, crayon and pencil on paper, 30×44″

Park Path Blue, Eileen O’Kane Kornreich (2019) Acrylic, pastel, crayon and pencil on paper, 30×44″

ANTE mag. You note that in this body of work that you build… “from society’s constructed beauty that masks atrocities below.” What about this contrast compelled you to create these artworks?

EO’KK. There are several written histories of the what and why of the potter’s field in and around what is now known as Washington Square Park. New York City has records of purchasing sections of the eastern side of the park for a potter’s field in 1790s. At that time, this land was already used by several African churches located near that same land when this area was farmland owned by freed slaves. The city has notes of the bodies dumped in the north west corned on the banks of the Minetta Creek: this was an area, again, long in use by the native population. This undesirable area was partitioned off to native peoples, freed slaves and rogue New Yorkers, The English and Dutch, then reclaimed as a potter’s field – can you imagine? I imagined then and still to this day, all the bodies laid or splayed, then topped with fill for years as the pandemic raged during humid summers or a citizen was murderer. A few decades after the last of the stink and vermin had died off, only then a military square is constructed for pageantry around the square mansions that have since been constructed. Imagine bunting and flags and shots of rifles children playing in and around where just a generation ago lay the bodies of a putrid death, some named some not, thrown into a ditch. We have a similar situation to this now at the area near World Trade Center: different, clearly, in terms of intent, but so many go about their day and eat lunches over the bodies of those killed in 9/11. Across the street is an African burial site that just received its historical plaque. And so, it goes, it’s all around us.

ANTE mag. These works feature emotionally charged colors, and the strong use of perspective in these works creates a sense of heightened anxiety and alienation. What are some of the emotions present in these works and why?

EO’KK. Emotionally charged color is my grammar, the construction of my visual language. While making these drawings, I am aware that I’m in a graveyard, that there is death beneath my feet – it brings to mind my husband’s graveyard in Valhalla, NY, which is gorgeous and shows diversity across its many sections, yet beneath these graves are even older burial sites of native peoples, settlers, anicent beasts….these layers of history continue endlessly. With Washington Square Park, that one particular corner has never had a plaque until they put a plaque at the arch noting that in the 19th century, ten African wooden caskets were placed at this site in 1850. But that begs the question of why these freed men and women of color were in this site, which at that time was still relatively undeveloped? Early settlers had no qualms about using free slaves as a buffer from native people’s attacks on first the Dutch, then the English took over. This is a part of our history we can find if we dig through the layers.  There are many perspectives in the park, off in one area you can even watch the light bouncing off the distant Hudson River, even noting a small square where you can see New Jersey. These photos were taken during walks in the winter and there is refracted light, light shining on in the darkness. This is my contemplation on color and perspective: how it’s read or absorbed by the viewer is for them to tell that story, I’ve told mine.

ANTE mag. The presence of trees is palpable in these works: what meaning do these park trees have for you, metaphorically, in this series?

EO’KK. The four-hundred-year-old American Elm in the Northwest corner of the park is a monument we locals call the Hanging Tree. That is my leading lady. If she could talk, she would set me straight. She would tell the burden of the dead and dying, and hangmen alike. The other trees, the recent plantings by our wealthy society, those represent the frivolous, the pageantry, the amnesia of a city wanting to not remember or know what they did, what happened in the past. 

ANTE mag. Can you explain your process in creating these compositions? For example, did you photograph the site from different angles then draw those with pencil on paper? Did you create these works en plein air?

EO’KK. While in the park, I photograph a path, a tree. I take upwards of three hundred shots with my camera and print what is valid to my eye. From these I construct a photo-collage of multiple perspectives, giving me a 360-degree view of a tree, shadow or path. It is a very cubist drawing which arises from the collage. I create the base drawing in pencil. From the base drawing, I work with acrylic, conte crayon, pastel, crayon and graphite to build the finished work. 

ANTE mag. You reference that these works recall “mysterious dreamscapes of nature.” Can you elaborate on that sentiment in relation to this body of work?

EO’KK. Once I start layering color with crayon and pastel the hard cubist edges are removed, and the multi-perspectives become one trippy, mysterious landscape.

What happens when we die? Every person who has lived during the age of reason has thought of the why’s and where’s of the afterlife. Does the answer lie with a god or gods, or spirits, or is it science? Why are some deaths celebrated and interred in strong, elaborate shrines while others are burned on a river or dumped in a marsh that becomes a celebrated park a few decades later? That’s just luck. My deeper thoughts are what happens after our internal light is out.

Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation | The 8th Floor Interview for 10xCommunity: “By Addressing Real Life in our Work, There is More Potential for Change”

ANTE Mag is focusing on ten projects that span creative disciplines and seek to build wider community ties between creative disciplines in our new series of interviews 10xCommunity. Featuring artistic projects, community-building initiatives and interdisciplinary platforms, ANTE is sharing these interviews on the mag and across social media that spotlight these endeavors through the current social crisis to pivot to sharing positivity and uplifting creative news to our audience. Shelly & Donald Rubin Foundation, The 8th Floor is a platform for socially engaged exhibitions and programs featuring artists of diverse backgrounds involving communities in dialogues around a range of social issues. ANTE contributor Mariel Tepper touched base with Executive/Artistic Direction at The 8th Floor, Sara Reisman, in order learn more about what types of initiatives they are enacting and following during CoVid-19.

(Lead image credits: Jane Benson. A Place for Infinite Tuning, 2014. Plywood, steel, mirrored plexiglass, wooden vase, latex paint, hand-cut artificial flowers, hand-cut oud and viola Photograph by Matthew Johnson, courtesy of the Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation.)

 

ANTE mag. How did The Rubin Foundation’s The 8th Floor get its start? What was the initial vision for how The 8th Floor could explore the intersection of art and social justice?

Sara Reisman. The 8th Floor was founded in 2010 by Shelley and Donald Rubin to showcase their private art collection, which, at the time, was focused on contemporary Cuban art. When I started at the Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation, as Artistic Director, in 2014, part of my charge was to help refine the mission of the Foundation, which was founded in the mid-1990s. The Foundation had supported arts and cultural organizations – ranging from visual arts presenters in New York City, to Himalayan art projects – as well as social justice organizations advocating for freedom of expression, gun control, and access to health care. In the process of identifying that the mission could be more precise in its support of organizations in New York City that were bringing art and social justice together, we determined that The 8th Floor could become a platform for art and dialogue around social justice themes. Initially, I thought there would be a few shows to articulate the Foundation’s interests. The first show I curated at The 8th Floor in 2015 was Mobility and Its Discontents, which included artists Jane Benson, Ángel Delgado, Lan Tuazon, and Javier Téllez, whose projects expressed the impacts of borders and strategies for transcending them. As we – my colleagues George Bolster, Anjuli Nanda Diamond, and I – continued to develop ideas for exhibitions, it became clear a series of shows on social justice themes, building upon one another, could be ongoing. In addition to the exhibitions, public programs and workshops are integral to providing audiences and the communities we serve with a discursive environment that is both communal and supportive of free expression. Without public programming, I think the effect of the exhibitions would be very different, less engaged. 

ANTE mag. The COVID-19 crisis has deeply impacted our society and the art world in unprecedented ways. What are some ways that the Rubin Foundation will stay connected and active in the arts community during this time?

SR. We recently launched a virtual series called Performance-in-Place, which we thought of as a way to engage with artists, providing them with support and a platform, to present new performances generated by the new social distancing measures (whatever that might mean for each of them.) Performance-in-Place will happen every third Tuesday evening (times depending on where the artists are located), our first event was led by Nicolás Dumit Estévez Raful Espejo, in the Bronx, with two collaborators Anna Recasens, and Laia Solé, who are based in different parts of Spain. Their conversation, On Art and Friendship, also showed excerpts from a new video piece they began working on in February to document the aspects of art praxis, that are often not shown in art spaces. For our team, it was moving to see how the three artists facilitated a discussion of sharing and connecting with a group largely consisting of individuals who are often in attendance at The 8th Floor. Forthcoming performances include presentations by Alice Sheppard with Kinetic Light (June 9), From the Collection of Eileen Myles (June 30,) Maria Hupfield (July 11,) a new piece titled Hotline by Aliza Shvarts (September 1,) and Latasha N. Nevada Diggs (September 22.) To complement the performance series, we are hosting monthly talks online as well. On May 28, I will moderate Places of Isolation and Healing, a conversation between Edgar Heap of Birds and Douglas Miles, and on June 18, I’ll be in conversation with artist and activist Carmen Papalia on facilitating accessibility in virtual spaces. 

Initially, I felt that the pressure to generate programs for virtual experiences was uninspiring. But two months into this, I’m realizing there is great potential to connect people internationally, across geographies. Of course, more than ever,  the notion of the digital divide is an issue, but I can see that as we learn to operate virtually, there is an opportunity to approach accessibility in new ways, online and eventually as we make the shift back to doing programs in person.

Mobility and Its Discontents, installation view at The 8th Floor From left to right, works by Alberto Borea, Jorge Wellesley, Lan Tuazon, Jane Benson Photograph by Matthew Johnson, courtesy of the Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation

 

ANTE mag. Your organization’s past exhibitions explore pressing social issues and concepts, from healthcare to mass surveillance to “different modes of resistance” in the series Revolutionary Cycles. Why is art and culture necessary in times of crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic?

SR. Revolutionary Cycles was conceived as a series of six exhibitions to examine the instruments of social and political transformation. In the first exhibition Revolution from Without…, which opened in January 2019, artists featured in the show – Chto Delat, Kameelah Janan Rasheed, Dread Scott, and others – expressed how change often comes from those on the margins of the polity, and the condition of being without – without rights, without representation, and without capital. It’s clear to me that in the current climate, a crisis of a failing health care system, capitalism run rampant, and rights being stripped away in the name of national security, art is essential for its capacity to communicate conditions that would otherwise be obscured. I also believe that even as the decision to make art is perceived by many to be one of privilege, being an artist is a precarious existence, and yet, artists constantly take risks in representing unpopular ideas, that question authority, that challenge the status quo. The next exhibition in the Revolutionary Cycles series, To Cast Too Bold a Shadow (originally scheduled to open on May 14 and postponed until at least the fall) is focused on entrenched forms of misogyny in our culture, and will feature works by Betty Tompkins, Joiri Minaya, Yoko Ono, Tracey Emin, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, and Aliza Shvarts, among others. With support from the Italian Council (a funding body of the Italian government) we are commissioning Maria D. Rapicavoli to make a new film, The Other: A Familiar Story, about immigration based on the life of a close relative. The project charts the oppression of a woman who emigrated to the U.S. from Italy, forced to leave her children behind, surviving an abusive relationship in the process. A Familiar Story becomes more timely given the immigration crisis we’ve been witnessing over the last decade, and now with the pandemic in which domestic abuse is compounded by quarantine. The logic behind Rapicavoli’s film demonstrates how artists are often thinking about what is below the surface.

ANTE mag. What have been some of your organization’s narrative goals with past exhibitions and programming, and how might those narratives come into play after this crisis?

SR. We obviously have no real idea what the outcome and conclusion of the pandemic will be, but our exhibitions together present a narrative in which questions of equity and human rights – whether they be LGBTQi rights, disability rights, or to do with reparations – are at the forefront. Regardless of what happens after this crisis (if there is a distinct ‘after’), I hope politically engaged art discourse can continue to be more grounded – as I feel we have been since the pandemic took hold –  in the realities we face as cultures, as communities, as a country. And to understand that reality is not always pleasant, or fair, or aesthetically digestible – but that by addressing real life in our work, there is more potential for change.

Betty Tompkins Apologia (Caravaggio #1), 2018 Courtesy of Betty Tompkins and P·P·O·W, New York

ANTE mag. Public events and programs are a vital aspect of The 8th Floor, with frequent artist talks accompanying exhibitions. During this time is your organization considering any alternative types of programming such as virtual talks or exhibitions?

SR. As I mentioned, last week (on May 19) we launched Performance-in-Place as a virtual series, and monthly talks, which right now feel like a good alternative to the fact that we can’t gather people in real time and space. With that in mind, if the pandemic means we can’t return to doing in-person programming in the fall, or by the end of the year, we will have learned how to conduct virtual programs. We are taking the time to do certain projects that are less immediately visible. For the last year we’ve been hosting a series of closed conversations called Access Check: Mapping Accessibility 2.0, which actually started with a public program last July at The 8th Floor. Organized in collaboration with choreographer and artist Jerron Herman, the talk brought together a group of artists, activists, and educators who have consistently advocated for disability rights and access in the cultural sector. We quickly realized there was a need to continue the discussion, and now we’re in the process of finalizing a survey for the field, split into two tracks: one for artists with disabilities about what is needed from institutions in terms of accessible and equitable programming; and another geared towards organizations and institutions, to understand what their capacity is in terms of facilitating accessible cultural programs. We hope the survey raises awareness about what institutions can do to become more accessible, while helping to formulate tools and language for artists with disabilities to advocate for what they need, similar to the way in which WAGE guidelines provide artists with talking points about payment for their work.

ANTE mag. Are there any current projects, funds or resources you would like to promote for artists or fellow organizations who have been impacted by COVID-19 shutdowns? 

SR. There are so many incredible efforts that have emerged in response to the pandemic. Here are a few that have impressed me in their concern for vulnerable communities:

• COVID-19 Dance Relief Fund – Linked here.
• Tri-State Relief Fund to Support Non-Salaried Workers in the Visual Arts – Linked here.  
• Artist Relief – Linked here. 
• The Crip Fund – Linked here. 

I’m also impressed by mutual aid efforts that have emerged. The Sunview Luncheonette set up a fund for workers at the Met foodmarket in Greenpoint – Linked here. 

ANTE mag. Can you tell us about your recent initiatives and what projects may be in store for the future of The Rubin Foundation?

SR.  After To Cast Too Bold a Shadow, we will stage the fifth exhibition in the series, titled In Kinship. The show will look at alternate family structures over the last 30 years, expanding the notion of family beyond heteronormative, nuclear, or government mandate, in the contexts of queer culture and immigrant communities. The sixth and final show of Revolutionary Cycles is After the Fall, which will reflect on the political moment to consider methods for the societal change needed to move beyond the political binaries that currently shape U.S. culture. The exhibition is conceived to anticipate various outcomes in our collective political future as articulated by artists and cultural producers, while simultaneously recognizing the need for spiritual transformation in times of crisis. Originally, After the Fall was meant to open around the time of the next presidential inauguration, with ‘the fall’ being open to interpretation. It makes me think of one of Dread Scott’s artworks featured in Revolution from Without…, titled Overthrow Dictators, which was made as part of the J20 inauguration protest in 2017. It’s a stencil with the phrase: by reading this, you agree to overthrow dictators.

Chto Delat
To those who (Migrants), 2019. Photograph by Julia Gillard. Courtesy of the artist and the Shelley and Donald Rubin Private Collection.

Culture Push Interview for 10xCommunity: “Voices that Will Help us Remake the World”

Interview by contributor Mariel Tepper

 

ANTE Mag is focusing on ten projects that span creative disciplines and seek to build wider community ties between creative disciplines in our new series of interviews, 10xCommunity. Featuring artistic projects, community-building initiatives and interdisciplinary platforms, ANTE is sharing these interviews on the mag and across social media that spotlight these endeavors through the current social crisis to pivot to sharing positivity and uplifting creative news to our audience. We here at ANTE have long been fans of Culture Push, a New York City-based nonprofit that unites art and social justice through its programs, including fellowships, an online journal, exhibitions and much more. Below we caught up with Artist, Professor and Culture Push Co-Founder Clarinda Mac Low for insights into the current events and initiatives Culture Push is moving ahead with in the time of CoVid-19.

ANTE: So tell us what inspired the creation of Culture Push, and how did you envision this organization as a way to foster artistic initiatives through public participation?

Culture Push: Dreaming up Culture Push was always a collective endeavor, because everything good, for me, happens in conversation. When the first glimmerings of Culture Push started, in 2008, I had been in conversation with many different people about the lack of space for hybrid artforms. At the time I was mostly situated in the dance and performance world, but not really fitting in there anymore (if I ever did) and talking to other people who felt the same way. I wanted to create a home for ideas that didn’t fit anywhere else. The name “Culture Push” came to me after a few conversations I had with Alejandra Martorell and Paul Benney, my partners in the collective TRYST. Culture Push was a name that left room for interpretation, but conveyed a sense of urgency. Then, after a series of conversations with Aki Sasamoto and Arturo Vidich, recent graduates of my alma mater, Wesleyan University, the first form of Culture Push was born. All three of us, though we were from different generations, had expertise both in dance and performance and in other disciplines and sectors, and an abiding interest in how art practice could function beyond the black box and the white cube. We could see how, by creating an entity, we could make a home for hybridity by creating an institution that was expansive in intent and encouraged cross-sector, public-facing conversation. 

We saw the institution itself as the art material, so, when we began, we didn’t actually know exactly what our focus would be. We were performance-makers, so we decided that the form of the organization would rise from experimentation and trial and error–our first step was just to create the institution–the entity–and then the form would emerge from action. So, in 2009, with the help of our amazing initial Board, we incorporated as a non-profit, and because of our Board member Michael Yi it went quite smoothly. 

As movement artists we were committed to corporeal practice and knowledge, and we began with a set of broad principles–our programs would bring together different sectors, would involve “hands-on” public participation and horizontal knowledge share, and would allow for collaboration. The first programs that we devised proceeded from these principles, and from our desire to nurture a fluid culture where the lines between art, politics, daily life, and social experiment could blur, and where challenging the lines between disciplines leads to challenging the form of society.   

ANTE: During this difficult time of the COVID-19 crisis, what are some ways that your organization plans to continue its mission in helping artists and communities affected by the pandemic?

CP: We currently have two major programs–The Fellowship for Utopian Practice (our bedrock) and the newer Associated Artists program. All of the artists we serve are in precarious situations financially and socially. Most of these artists also work as independent contractors, often within an arts context where they are facing cancellations, postponements, and lay-offs, as well as loss of future work. Many of these artists also act as community supporters, and are donating their time and energy to creating space and providing essential services to their fellow New Yorkers. 

To support our artists, we are working with our funders to expand the financial support we offer our current Fellows and Associated Artists, as well as our recent alumni, by offering expanded funding for their ongoing projects and funding for the projects they have begun during this crisis. We also want to offer them opportunities to share work and be in community with each other and with the wider world, and will be brainstorming about how to re-cast their projects for the current time. We are also planning on offering new opportunities, like paying them to give online workshops or presentations, or setting up networking events. The bottom line is to support these important voices in any way we can–they are the voices that will help us remake the world in a better form as this crisis develops and (hopefully!) resolves.

Storm Your Brain—Culture Push Program DOING, by Aki Sasamoto, at the Whitney Museum, 2010. Photo by Arturo Vidich

ANTE: Can you talk about how Culture Push has been able to amplify initiatives that have been started by individuals and groups to help artists and others who have been financially impacted by COVID-19?

CP: The people who are connected to Culture Push tend to be self-starters and community responders. In the initial shock of the shutdown, for example, Shawn Escarciga – at the time Assistant Director of Culture Push – reacted as an individual concerned for the impact that the loss of work would have on people who are already living precariously and responded by immediately starting a GoFundMe, the NYC Low-Income Artist/Freelancer Relief Fund. He was immediately joined by Nadia Tykulsker, one of the current Culture Push Board members. This was not an initiative begun by Culture Push, but, early in the process Shawn and Nadia reached out to Culture Push staff to talk about fiscal sponsorship for the Fund. I had also been thinking about this, and it was great to come together and offer this fiscal sponsorship to a fund that was addressing such urgent need. The fund has, to date, raised over $150,000.

At Culture Push we often talk about the “performance of institution”: that is, we are very small and barebones with a modest budget, but, because we are in good financial standing and our organizational bona fides are strong, we are able to act as a institutional partner when people require a financial or otherwise established entity to get what they need. So, after the success of the partnership with the NYC Low-Income Artist/Freelancer Relief Fund, we decided, for now, to expand our fiscal sponsorship program to include emergency funds independently initiated by staff, Fellows, and other artists in our community that serve low-income, BIPOC, and queer artists, and artists and others based in vulnerable New York City neighborhoods. So far, besides the NYC Low-Income Artist/Freelancer Relief Fund, we are also acting as a sponsor for the Dance Union’s NYC Dancers Relief Fund (COVID-19), started by J. Bouey and Melanie Greene, and for the North Bronx Collective, a group of activists in the Bronx (Alicia Grullòn, a Fellowship alum and current Board member, is a member of the group). By serving as a conduit for higher levels of funding from foundations or individuals, this fiscal sponsorship has so far enabled these emergency funds to greatly expand the financial support they can offer to the people they serve. We don’t take an admin fee, so all funds go directly to the people who need it.

ANTE: In your most recent exhibition, RE-TOOLING, artists developed multidisciplinary “practical tools” for resistance and social change, incorporating dance, performance, installation, and writing. A tool was redefined as a means for “individuals to change their environment (socially, politically, physically) or engage with it in a new way.” Can you speak on the power of creative tools and outlets to help us cope in times of hardship/uncertainty?   

CP: Culture Push is grounded in the conviction that having space for imagination is as important to survival as more tangible resources like food and shelter. Indeed, imagination is how we figure out how to gain those resources under difficult circumstances. Imagination allows us to create work-arounds and new situations when a situation is challenging, but also gives us space to be present, or to escape, or to fully realize ourselves as individuals or as members of a group. It allows us to transcend difficulty, to connect to each other and to the other creatures we share space with, to invent new ways of being.

So having access to creativity is imperative for all people, especially people in difficult circumstances. And everybody is creative–whether the results of creative endeavor are recognized as “art” by a mainstream art world is immaterial. Sometimes it takes a nudge here and there for people to find a voice, but it’s always present. The artists in the RE-TOOLING show have developed some nudging tools par excellence, and there are many important voices that are born from their experiments. I’m also reminded of Claudia Prado, who has devised a writing workshop that she runs with working-class Spanish-speaking immigrants (documented and undocumented). The work these people, mostly women, come up with is gorgeous and valuable, from voices we don’t hear often enough. The voices come out easily–they just need the right opportunity and the right catalyst.

ANTE: In addition to physical exhibitions and public projects, Culture Push also features the online journal PUSH/PULL. Can you explain how this publication is integral to the Culture Push mission, and how digital publications/exhibitions could be a way for arts organizations to adapt in the time of social distancing?

CP: This is a great question, and definitely one we have been thinking about a lot. From the beginning we have seen some form of publication as an asset to the Culture Push community. The first version of this was IdeaNEWS, a publication that reflected on the year that had passed through its form rather than its content. IdeaNEWS was active from 2009-2011. Then, in 2015, our then-Assistant Director Madelyn Ringold-Brown, proposed starting an online publication as a supplement to the Fellowship–a place for Fellows to publicly share their process, work with collaborators, develop ancillary philosophies… basically another part of the public square. It’s since evolved to be a venue where our Associated Artists engage as well. 

CP artists usually bring together groups of people as an integral part of their projects, but now that physical distancing has become a norm and so much of our lives are happening online, we will need a different venue for gathering and creating community. Since PUSH/PULL is already there, and is already known as a venue for quality content, we plan to expand it as a platform, and bring in as much of our community as possible. It’s an exciting possibility, because, while it has been an effective venue for writing, because it lives mainly online it also has been a repository for video, images, graphics, and other media. We are also exploring how it can be interactive.

ArtCraftTech: Tracing Trash, 2010, at McCarren Park. Photo by Peter Stankiewicz

ANTE: One of your organization’s early projects, ArtCraftTech, brought together several creative disciplines (artists, scientists, technology experts) to find artistic and practical solutions to short-term problems, like waste management, through collaboration and dialogue. What are some takeaways on how creative, publicly engaged projects like these can help us deal with real-world problems and inspire collective action for change? 

CP: When we first established Culture Push, all three co-founders started different programs. ArtCraftTech was my “baby,” so to speak, and the form of the program reflected both my experience in devising collaborative performance and my experience working in microbiology laboratories. 

I have a desire to address so-called “real-world” problems directly, but I am also suspicious of the abbreviated process that many cross-sector endeavours seem to engage in. With ArtCraftTech, I gathered people from different professions together and acted as a facilitator as we decided, all together, what problem(s) we wanted to take on. Once we determined that, we decided what questions we wanted to ask, but were not expected to come up with workable solutions–it was clear that solving the problems we were taking on required deep systemic change and far more resources than we had on hand. We did generally end up coming up with some very concrete possibilities for mitigating the problem, but also more subtle approaches, and projects that were provocations as well as “solutions.”

 Engaging in this process, which was a series of meetings that took place over several months, really showed us all how a long, slow, thoughtful process of development can illuminate different aspects of a problem, and bring new ideas to the fore that may have been hiding underneath the more obvious solutions. This was reminiscent of (good) laboratory research, where repeated experiments and the data they bring leads you into unexpected territory, and shows you where you need to go. It’s interesting to think about this now, because, when I was working in laboratories, I was working with HIV, and there is a delicate tension, in disease research, between the urgency of cure and the need for caution and careful observation. I think we’re all being gripped in that narrative now–so much desiring a quick fix for this overwhelming pandemic, but in danger of grabbing on to the first dubious solution that comes along…

Anyway, I digress. 🙂  This understanding of the importance of process imbued all of the co-founders’ programs, and it definitely influenced the form for the Fellowship for Utopian Practice. We were clear from the beginning that the Fellowship needed to be at least a year long, and it needed to privilege process over product, or, as I eventually said, “Process is our product.” This was somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but it’s also true–we are advocating for an arts ecosystem that privileges and supports a thoughtful development process as much as if not more than a specific product or object. Only this will truly allow for deep conversation and lasting change.

ANTE: Can you tell us about some of your recent initiatives and where Culture Push headed in the near future?

CP: Currently our big project is Walking the Edge, a project we’re doing in collaboration with Works on Water and the NYC Department of City Planning. The two arts organizations are working with the Waterfront and Open Spaces Division of the NYC DCP to create a durational artwork that invites everybody to walk all 520 miles of New York City’s coastline, to get people involved with thinking about NYC as a city of water, and to gather deep engagement around the DCP’s Comprehensive Waterfront Plan for 2030. That walk was supposed to start on May 1 (520 in 5/20, get it?) and continue for 24 hours a day until the whole coast was covered. So yeah. We are adjusting. It’s interesting, actually, and not entirely bad, to slow down and reconsider. So, instead of the walk this year, now we are launching prompts and questions and suggestions and performances about our waterfronts, by artists from Culture Push and Works on Water, every Friday at noon on Instagram (at @works_on_water, @culturepusher, and @nycwaterfront).  

Also, we have gathered all the materials for a 10th Anniversary publication that featured several Fellows writing about subjects related to the projects they did with CP, and we were planning to publish and print in April and distribute in June of this year. Of course now that timeline has shifted, but we will be making that available soon as a downloadable .pdf

For the future? Interesting question. There was the Plan for the Future Before, and there’s a Plan for the Future Now. We were finally thinking about creating a hub space for Culture Push (we have been an itinerant organization this whole time, with no fixed physical location or office). That’s still our desire, but, because so many things are so up in the air, how that will play out is very much an open question. Regardless, we will continue supporting artists as they collaborate with communities and create spaces for imagination and solidarity.

 

AOT Project Salon Interview for 10xCommunity: “The Arts are Vital to Individual and Community Empowerment”

ANTE Mag is focusing on ten projects that span creative disciplines and seek to build wider community ties between creative disciplines in our new series of interviews, 10xCommunity. Featuring artistic projects, community-building initiatives and interdisciplinary platforms, ANTE is sharing these interviews on the mag and across social media that spotlight these endeavors through the current social crisis to pivot to sharing positivity and uplifting creative news to our audience. AOT Project Salon is the brainchild of curator and cultural producer Douglas Turner, a Brooklyn-based arts stalwart. We sat down with Turner for a wider perspective on the projects keeping him busy in these trying times.

 

Artist Courtney Alexander in front of her collaborative project sponsored by the Lower East Side Girls Club presentation, Art on Paper 2020 – coordinated by AOT Project Salon

 

ANTE: Thanks Douglas for sitting down with us today to discuss AOT Project Salon! Can you start out by giving us some background on AOT Project Salon and how it got started in 2014?

Douglas Turner: Hello Audra! And thanks so much for featuring AOT Project Salon. From the top, I would like to acknowledge all the people who made AOT possible; this is not something I could have done on my own. AOT is an acronym for the Architecture of Tomorrow and comes from a manifesto I wrote for myself after graduating from the New School back in 2009. From there I decided to focus my sociological writerly intentions on the arts. A retired art critic and I had become friends and he began introducing me to the art world. A few years later, I wanted to put ideas into action. I was sharing a tiny house in Williamsburg with a good friend who totally supported me converting the second floor (which was an open loft bedroom)  for exhibitions. I would hide the bed behind an armoire!

 

ANTE: How has AOT Project Salon evolved since its founding, and what current objectives are part of your mission?

DT: In 2015, I had (curated) something around seven or eight shows, focusing on re-emerging, emerging, and under-represented artists. Did you know that insurance companies google (certain) addresses, and when they find out something is going on in a home besides its intended purpose they get real threatening? This understandably made the landlord uncomfortable, and that’s when I began doing satellite shows in Manhattan, partnering with the Lower East Side Girls Club organization, where I am now on the Art Advisory Board. Partnering with them gave me access to a storefront location on Avenue C. I was able to continue a bi-annual project called Our Elements, a collaborative exhibition of queer and feminist art. During all of this, I had also begun working on arts-in-education projects in Brownsville and Crown Heights. What began as The Equal Education Initiative, I worked with former Senator Jesse Hamilton to bring workshops and summer art programs to children. Currently, the education program is on hiatus while I work in the background on a huge undertaking to fund a mobile art education program (MOart). Imagine a 26-foot box truck, converted into a classroom that can arrive at various locations, like housing projects and other community organizations to provide structured after-school art classes.

AOT Project Salon loft space in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

ANTE: Incredible.. and so, how exactly has the current pandemic affected your programming and what are you doing to stay resourceful and create impact during this “pause”?

DT: Honestly, I was already on a pause, so I don’t feel AOT Project Salon has been deeply impacted, however, I’d say that organizations like mine that help to provide resources and opportunities (no matter how large or small) for under-represented artists and curators, and extra-curricular services for underserved communities will be in high demand in the coming years due to the fall out of the pandemic. I think it will take a few “Town Halls,” before I know what precise actionable steps I should take.

ANTE: You actively seek ways to stretch far and wide to engage varied members of the community, from your work championing the Lower East Side Girls Club to your online initiative, Wedge Studio. Talk to us about how these challenges feed one another and keep you inspired.

DT: Ideas are a natural resource, and I don’t seem to be low on those resources. The Girls Club has my heart. It was founded about 25 years ago by Lyn Pentecost and Jenny Dembrow. They now operate out of a new 25,000 sq. ft. facility on 8th and D. Their positive impact on the community is amazing. It’s an academy for Girls and expanding with services for the entire neighborhood. Serving as an art advisor is an amazing privilege, and amplifies my ability to provide resources to artists. My latest project was working on a residency for Courtney Alexander, a painter and sculptor who also created Dust ll Onyx – a melanated tarot deck. Courtney worked with the girls on a tarot project, which was shown at the Girls Club’s Art on Paper booth this year. Wedge Studio is a for-profit business I launched this year. Being able to play a part in providing the opportunity and exposure for Courtney, was simply a matter of doing the right thing.

In conversation at AOT Project Salon, Williamsburg, Brooklyn

ANTE: Arts education is an important subject for you: can you explain why you think it key to connect communities through arts programming?

DT: For me, it comes down to national statistics. When art education is provided in a child’s education there is a direct correlation between academic performance and the likelihood of going on to college. But in a city like New York, the arts have been defunded by 40%, and those impacted the most by these measures are poor and/or members of black and brown communities across the boroughs. The arts are vital to individual and community empowerment. Folks of these communities know this because they see what is missing in their neighborhoods and schools as generational poverty continues. In my experience in Brownsville, I saw not just parents but adults in the community rally behind arts education for children. The arts have the power to rally people, which in turn shows community vibrancy and strength, a great source of pride in where one calls home.

ANTE: What’s one challenge that you see not being addressed or underrated that you want to see more resources diverted to in terms of art and cultural production? And finally, what are your plans to connect the art community once this challenging moment has passed? 

DT: A disparaging amount of resources are being funneled upwards. Would that be late-stage capitalism? Think about the troubling levels of access to space and the dizzying pace of real estate. I think that path is suffocating, or cannibalistic, like a snake eating its own tail. It would appear that the focus is on prestige rather than merit, which lends itself to stagnation.

I want to hit the ground running. I have no desire to rush into things while this pandemic continues, but instead be strategic. Be honest, we have no idea what post-pandemic life will be like. The quarantine will end in the summer, but social practices will be greatly affected through 2021. My main focus will most likely be on digital presentations, focusing on online engagement for the benefit of artists. If there is anything I know I can do for the art community, it is to create platforms.

Social Distanzine Interview for 10xCommunity: “Give Artists as Much Visibility as Possible”

ANTE Mag is focusing on ten projects that span creative disciplines and seek to build wider community ties between creative disciplines in our new series of interviews, 10xCommunity. Featuring artistic projects, community-building initiatives and interdisciplinary platforms, ANTE is sharing these interviews on the mag and across social media that spotlight these endeavors through the current social crisis to pivot to sharing positivity and uplifting creative news to our audience. Social Distanzine is a joint effort by co -editors Allison Remy Hall, a Jersey City-based curator, and Detroit-based artist and illustrator Narciso Espiritu.

The Instagram platform features art created during the Zeitgeist of the CoVid-19 Pandemic. We discussed their initiative to learn more about the ripples it has made in the larger arts community.

 

ANTE:  Allison, Narciso, thank you both for chatting with us about this project – can you start by sharing the genesis of this with our readers?

Allison Remy Hall: Like a lot of people in the midst of the coronavirus crisis, I was following an impulse to start a project that would help to pass the time indoors. For me, the primary joy of curatorial work is that exhibitions are generative of community. I wanted to do something that would manifest virtual elements of those in-person encounters with art and people that we are all missing now. I asked my friend and illustrator @narcisoespiritu if he would come aboard as co-editor, and together with a few other contributors we have set about creating a document of the experiences and work of the global arts community during this time.

 

Narciso Espiritu: Initially, Allison approached me with a few tentative names for something that would function as a document of this time in the arts, and I quickly embraced the idea. I’ve had experience with art publications of my own, so I felt like I could lend a hand in this effort. Also, we have worked pretty well together on previous projects, so it feels like a smooth collaboration.

Images published as part of “Social Distanzine” on Instagram (@social_distanzine)

 

ANTE: Social_Distanzine serves as a platform for the wider art community to unify (remotely) in the time of CoVid-19; can you talk to us about what you are hoping to highlight with this initiative?

ARH: I think sharing the work of all mediums that artists are making now, as well as interviews with people across the arts community, is a way to collect and connect subjective experiences and impressions of this moment. This in turn creates a record through which we can consider the whole of this time, and perhaps be reminded of the smallness of our current physical separation from each other. Of course we also want to give artists as much visibility as possible–Times are tough psychically and materially.

NE: This time is important for everyone. It allows for everyone to pause, take note of what they really appreciate, and evaluate what’s broken or doesn’t work quite as well as they want it to. Artists of all disciplines are kind of the arrowhead here. Folks are absorbing what’s going on, and they’re gonna funnel that energy into something. Even if it doesn’t quite make sense now. There has to be a way to express this strange feeling a lot of people are living with.

 

ANTE: Does the platform have a particular lens on art that engages with the covid-19 pandemic, or merely works made during this time, and why?

ARH: As described, this is kind of an overarching archival or historical approach–we’re doing our best not to exclude any works–Even if they don’t reference covid-19 directly, they are still products of the time. We are really keen to maintain a diverse exhibition in terms of medium, and are hoping to see more performing arts, writing, and musical works in addition to all of the amazing visual arts submissions we’re receiving.

 

NE: I think we’re all processing the pandemic in our own ways. We could be checking the numbers every day, zoning out to some activity, or actually helping on the front lines– but it doesn’t diminish the importance of it on a granular level. Because we all matter here. Personally, the work I’m making is not reflective of the pandemic. Maybe I’ll make something related to my mental experience during this time later on, but it’s just a lot of information and anxiety that I don’t quite know how to transform.   

ANTE: You’ve provided insights through interviews on remote residencies and opportunities available to artists; what about this aspect of engaging the art community is critical to your team?

ARH: The interviews were Narciso’s idea. This is a really tough time for the arts and other related creative industries, and we felt there could be some practical benefit to sharing not only opportunities, but a kind of inside-perspective. We describe these interviews as lo-fi chats with people in the arts community across the world. We hope that adding these voices to the chronicle will lead to a better understanding of what people are doing/dealing with now, and what the arts might look like later. Our first one was with Matt Davis at @perfectlyacceptable, a risograph press and publishing house based in Chicago.

NE: Interviews with creatives and other notable folks in the local Jersey City arts community was something I used to do with a publication I used to run, called Instigatorzine. It was a vehicle for me to meet people and learn about how they got to that point in their lives, but I also just enjoyed the process and results. Sharing the personalities and work of many people with many people fulfilled me in a unique way. Doing the SD Interviews is very special for the moment we’re all in, because we’re delivering this perspective that you won’t likely see in other media. Inviting folks to see and listen to the people behind the artwork is important, especially now.

Interview featured on Instagram, “Perfectly Acceptable” (visit @social_distanzine)

ANTE: In terms of the submissions you feature on the platform, can you speak to the challenges in presenting certain mediums given the format of the platform (are some projects/works easier to present than others?)

ARH: Totally. We are doing our best to do justice to everything that is submitted. Instagram isn’t ideal for some works, which is why I also set up a webpage for the webzine at nosucharts.com/social_distanzine (a work in progress). We are playing with the idea of creating a print edition, which of course would pose other challenges for our inclusive approach.

ANTE: Can you walk us through the types of responses you hope to inspire in your audience?

ARH: I want people to feel less alone, and have the opportunity to experience a small form of collective engagement aside from our inexorable shared suffering.

 

NE: I moved to Detroit a few months before COVID got serious in the States. While I’ve been to the city several times over, it’s still new and I have a relatively small social circle compared to when I lived on the East Coast. Working with Allison on SD helps me feel less alone out here. It’s good that the SD audience can experience this unity, too.

“Untitled” featured on Intsagram (work by @artbyjosephinec | @social_distanzine)

ANTE: What are your plans for this platform post-pandemic?

ARH: It is so difficult to think beyond the end of a single day right now. There’s kind of a fog over the future, but we are doing some brainstorming about creating print issues (though that may happen before the end of pandemic?).  Who knows!

 

NE: Honestly, I get kind of upset that I cannot note time passing some days. It’s easy to get ahead of ourselves because of that. I tend to go galaxy-brain on this stuff, so I write things down instead and return to them later. I’ve always believed in printed material, but that’s a bridge I can’t see yet.

Artfully Learning Interview for 10xCommunity: “Lifelong Learning via the Arts”

ANTE Mag is focusing on ten projects that span creative disciplines and seek to build wider community ties between creative disciplines in our new series of interviews, 10xCommunity. Featuring artistic projects, community-building initiatives and interdisciplinary platforms, ANTE is sharing these interviews on the mag and across social media that spotlight these endeavors through the current social crisis to pivot to sharing positivity and uplifting creative news to our audience. Artfully Learning was founded by art educator, artist and curator Adam Zucker, and mounts an experiential and critical cross-examination of the fine art world and educational sphere. We caught up with Adam to learn more about how he is adapting his coverage to suit a post-CoVid19 society.

ANTE: Thanks for chatting! So tell us about your community. What urgent need inspired you to begin your work with Artfully Learning?

Adam Zucker: I entered the arena of art education (K-12) coming from a background that was largely in the fine arts field, so I had far less experience and training than many of my fellow students upon entering the Master’s in Art Education program at Brooklyn College. I was a bit apprehensive and timid initially. I felt out of place. However, my professors, Linda Louis and Toby Needler encouraged me to combine my prior knowledge of Art History and my professional experience as a curator and arts writer, with the experiential education I was receiving in art pedagogy.  I also took a class on Visual Culture with Dr. Cheri Ehrlich, where we were prompted to create documentation of our journey to become art educators, and that was the birth of Artfully Learning. It was initially about finding my comfort zone to approach topics related to teaching and learning, but it has evolved into a resource that has helped a variety of individuals integrate contemporary art practices into educational frameworks.

 

ANTE: You root the content and resources you provide in critical theory and in vanguard knowledge (such as the Lincoln Center’s Capacities for Imaginative Learning program) talk about your priorities when you are selecting what you include on the platform?

AZ: I select material and content that I find interesting and that I am passionate about. Because I believe that learning to create and respond to art is intrinsic with the human experience, I have taken a very constructivist approach to my platform. I present ways that contemporary art can benefit social, emotional and cognitive development, and suggest how works from a wide range of artists might be incorporated into K-12 curricula on a macro and micro scale. I am in full support of art-centered learning throughout the curriculum, which means that the arts are in partnership with the other subjects, not in service to them.

ANTE:  Does the platform have a particular lens on engaging the wider community and producing necessary resources during the CoVid-19 pandemic, and how?

AZ: There is a specific page on Artfully Learning on social distance learning, where I have been posting my own lesson plans (that can be scaffolded for instruction and realized at home), as well as other resources from the field in response to the sudden transition to remote learning and homeschooling. The page will continue to be updated for as long as educators and students are away from their physical classrooms.

ANTE: Artfully Learning has received incredible critical reception in light of the pandemic – can you tell us about where the platform has been featured and share insights into feedback you’ve received from your audience?

AZ: I am always most grateful and excited when I get feedback from readers of my blog. I speak to my educator friends on almost a weekly basis, and have been so inspired by their devotion and passion for both adapting and pushing the boundaries of the unique situation we’ve been facing. We constantly share ideas and resources. The education community is one of the most selfless and tireless professional communities. As far as where my blog has been featured, I have seen a lot of recent traffic coming from BOMB Magazine, Bushwick Daily, and various University listservs. I feel most rewarded for my work when teachers and school administrators share my writing with their own networks.

ANTE: What urgent need does the community have right now for greater access to art education?

AZ: Education in general needs to be more accessible to reflect the diversity of the community. More resources are needed for students and teachers, so that they’re able to collaboratively learn and thrive in a safe and healthy environment. It is painfully clear how underfunded and unprepared our education systems are to support the most vulnerable students and provide teachers with materials and aid that they need. There is enormous inequity. All students should have access to resources that nourish the mind, body, and spirit. The arts do this by giving students a means for personal expression, and fostering a sense of self and collective values. Everyone has the ability to think and perform in an artful manner, despite their technical skills. The arts strengthen our ability to be flexible and make judgements in the absence of clear cut solutions. In this day and age of unknowns and uncertainties, it is the critical and creative thinking we acquire from art education, which will keep us innovating and responding to problems in an empathetic manner. Just look at how many artists are currently making and donating masks for essential workers.

ANTE: Who do you envision as your audience for the content you share and has that shifted since the pandemic began?

AZ: My audience has always been in flux since day one. When I began, it was mainly my own network from art and art education circles. Later, my writing started to reach the larger arts and education community. It has grown and expanded to where I can’t define any one specific group or groups of readers. I want my content to be accessible and useful to anyone who comes across my blog.

ANTE: What actions are you taking in the near future to contribute to the wider community, and how can ANTE readers get involved and support?

AZ: I am going to stick with what I do best, which is to write about the relationship between the arts and our human experiences. What I hope that I can provide is a spark and a thirst for my readers to continue their quest for lifelong learning via the arts. As I mentioned, I’m maintaining a page where I’ll contribute my own original lesson plans and other resources from a variety of sources that focus on creating, viewing, and presenting art remotely. I’d be happy to connect with more people who have similar and different experiences. I’m always looking to expand and diversify the content that I write about. ANTE readers can feel free to make suggestions, share their experiences, and let others know about the blog!

Waves and Archives Interview for 10xCommunity: “Fashion as a Medium of Art”

ANTE Mag is focusing on ten projects that span creative disciplines and seek to build wider community ties between creative disciplines in our new series of interviews,10xCommunity. Featuring artistic projects, community-building initiatives and interdisciplinary platforms, ANTE is sharing these interviews on the mag and across social media that spotlight these endeavors through the current social crisis to pivot to sharing positivity and uplifting creative news to our audience. Waves and Archives founded by Manan Ter-Grigoryan, Marianna Kosheleva and Julian Jimarez-Howard in 2018, endorses fashion as an art form across academic, instutional and art world settings. For our very first 10xCommunity interview we sat down to learn more on the Waves & Archives leadership team’s perspectives on fashion as a radical artistic platform.

 

ANTE: Thanks for chatting! Let’s start with your beginning – was there a specific catalyst that brought Waves and Archives into being? What was your initial vision for how Waves and Archives could change the landscape for fashion-related projects and their presence in the greater art world?

W&A: As it often happens with projects such as this, many stars had to align for things to start coming together in a concrete form of an exhibition and a certain plan for the future of Waves and Archives. For me, Manan Ter-Grigoryan, the motivation for this project was a certain reluctance I faced in graduate school from faculty members who were tacitly implying fashion was not art, and therefore I could not write my thesis on then still alive Alexander McQueen. Things became increasingly concrete when several years ago I got a call from a friend and colleague Julian Jimarez Howard wanting to start a publication that would focus on fashion as a medium of art. But it wasn’t until Marianna Kosheleva joined our trifecta with her strategy and vision that we all got the push we needed to move our project forward. So to answer your question, I think more than any occurrences, PEOPLE are catalysts. The vision for Waves and Archives has always been to promote fashion as a medium of art, and the need to do so in all domains simultaneously with a library, a publication and a gallery seemed like the most organic response.

 

ANTE: Can you walk us through your “manifesto” present on your website? How do you envision this Statement of Rights as charting a new course for the relationship between the overlap of Fashion and the Art World?

W&A: For as long as I can remember, I felt that fashion was not only one of art’s media, but that it was a medium most challenging- in terms of curation, complex- in terms of analysis, and profound- in terms of conceptual underpinnings. As fashion started to enter art museums, without the platform of a gallery and without any academic and institutional backing within the art-world proper, it became prescient to create a space for one of the richest forms of artistic production, to flourish without the imposing limitations of its own industry. The manifesto which comes in a form of a statement of rights is there to highlight the injustices and reaffirm the goals. As things change, so will the manifesto, so its date becomes a part of its own archive.

Above: Install view of Sinead O’Dwyer’s solo exhibition, “In Myself” at Waves & Archives; Below: “Lace Up Martina II” (2019) by Sinead O’Dwyer, both views at Waves and Archives for the artist’s solo show “In Myself” (images courtesy of Waves and Archives and the Artist)

ANTE: Talk to us about Sinead O’Dwyer’s “In Myself”: you note that O’Dwyer’s work”retain(s) a distinctively grounded relationship to the reality of experiences and forms of the persons whose bodies they originally emulate.” Can you elaborate on why O’Dwyer’s works became your first exhibition as an entity? 

W&A: Sinéad deals with the question of body politics in a way that not many fashion artists have dealt with before. As fashion has largely responded to this question by blindly promoting arbitrary inclusiveness, and in the process only re-establishing binary dichotomies, such as normal/ alternative, Sinéad does not use the “norm” as a departure point to suggest “the alternative”. She uses each body as its own departure point, thus over and over – whether it be with her silicone pieces or the woven ones – establishing the original body as the authoritative subject. I think this is a very important statement to make in a world where the fashion industry drives women into body dysmorphia, and on a larger scale – archetypes drive people to mental illness.

ANTE: In addition to the Gallery exhibitions, your online presence incorporates an Atlas and a Journal: can you explain how these materials are crucial to the W&A mission? 

W&A: As mentioned earlier, it was important for us to suggest a drastic change in the space that fashion is given in institutional, academic or art-world settings, and it was important for us to make that change as organic as possible. It is not simply about giving fashion artists gallery representation, or creating a gallery that has fashion as its focus, but also about creating a space where academic thought on fashion can freely coalesce without having to be confined to either art or fashion publications, and about providing access to the type of knowledge that is made available to many artists working in traditionally accepted art media to artists working in fashion by creating a library. The Atlas is a knowledge visualization map that gives access to the way Western academia studies art criticism to anyone who might be interested to learn. I have spent 3 years researching connections between 150 thinkers who have produced knowledge most central to art (in all its adjacent disciplines: anthropology, sociology, cultural studies, visual studies, philosophy, psychoanalysis, political studies, etc.) mapping five categories of relationships between those thinkers, and mapping those relationships in a visual atlas. This project that we call Waves and Archives Atlas maps out 12,551 connections, thus sharing a visual key to art criticism as it is today. It is important for us that when we do represent fashion artists, it is not in a vacuum.

Above: “Frontal Fragment” (2018) by Sinead O’Dwyer, on view at Waves and Archives for the artist’s solo show “In Myself” Below: “Torso Fragment I” (2018) by Sinead O’Dwyer, on view at Waves and Archives for the artist’s solo show “In Myself”(images courtesy Waves and Archives and the Artist)

ANTE: Art Theory and Semantics are Woven into the mission of W&A as your Instagram and website link to critics such as Adorno and Derrida: what was missing in the art theory/art critical landscape with regards to Fashion’s role in the greater field and how does Waves and Archives fill that role?

W&A: In reality nothing is missing, except assignment. What I mean is that the knowledge that we apply to the study of any form of art is not necessarily produced with that application in mind. Adorno did not write directly about art, Foucault did not write about art and frankly neither did Derrida. We, as art academics, have applied that knowledge to art criticism because art does not exist in a vacuum. Similarly, we ask that the same knowledge is applied to the study of fashion as a medium of art, leveling the playing field of intellectual rigor. To give an example without calling out names, a famous art publication described the MET “Heavenly Bodies” exhibition with the words: “Will make you feel all godly…” – the kind of vocabulary clearly inadmissible in their coverage of any other art exhibitions.

 

ANTE: How do each of your founding member’s backgrounds inform the mission of W&A? 

W&A: Growing up in six countries, in a constant state of embracing and adapting to new cultures while my cultural references kept being re-contextualized, dress and visual culture in general, allowed me (Manan Ter-Grigoryan) to recognize patterns and find my footing before I could gain fluency in languages. I am very academically inclined, and Waves and Archives is my dream and life’s mission, so I am making an effort to ground it in reality. 

Marianna Kosheleva who has graduate degrees in Rocket Science and Press Relations, has a healthy distance from the subject of our endeavor, while maintaining a strong passion for the complexity of its realization. I think it is this knack for realizing complex multi-faceted projects that drives Marianna within this project.

Julian Jimarez Howard is a bright gallerist, writer, and a contemporary art curator, with an amazing grasp of a perspective that is not purely Western-centric, a rare understanding of textiles, and a visionary outlook on fashion’s prowess as an art form. He is an awesome partner who can talk to you about Derrida while installing a drywall.

 

Installation view of Sinead O’Dwyer’s solo exhibition, “In Myself” at Waves & Archives (image courtesy of Waves & Archives)

 

ANTE: Talk us through your recent initiatives and where W&A is headed in the near future?

W&A: Our most recent initiative was the launch of our gallery Waves and Archives with an ambitious solo show of works by Sinéad O’Dwyer. In signing a contract with us, she became the first ever fashion artist to be represented by an art gallery dedicated to showing fashion artists exclusively. We are hoping that our next show (a group show of both emerging and established fashion artists) coincides with the launch of our Waves and Archives journal. Let this serve as a call for papers 🙂 In the meantime, we continue working on the design of our Atlas – the knowledge visualization map and its interactivity. 

Transcending Reality: An Interview with Artist Marion Grant

Artist Marion Grant is a lifelong creative innovator, with a career spanning fine arts, graphic art and textile design. Her work strongly aligns itself with spiritual growth, and her strong use of color and lyrical compositions follow the precedent of other spiritual artists such as Wassily Kandinsky and Anselm Kiefer. For Grant, however, spiritual development and transcendence serve as key attributes in her art-making. Her focus as a fine artist distinctly embraces self-empowerment. Combining a decades-long artistic practice keenly melding color field theory and harmoniously blending distinct visual elements, Grant’s work continues to speak on a personal level to her collectors, peers and all who encounter her works.

Grant, Marion. Blue Dragonfly (2018) 16″x 15″ alternative media on handmade transparent acrylic skin, image courtesy the artist.

ANTE. You work in a very multi-disciplinary style, from digital art to fabric to mixed media. What originally encouraged you to develop your talents as an artist across different mediums? How has your practice evolved?

 

MG. I feel like all my life experiences coalesce into how I approach art-making. After studying Fine Arts at the California College of the Arts in Oakland, I got my dream job working for the artist Frances Butler who was a huge idol of mine. Working with her, I was responsible for silk-screening fine art textiles. Butler was truly an influential artist for me.

Eventually I returned to New York to pursue a career in the textile industry which was headquartered there. I attended classes at Parsons to learn some specific skills for the industry, eventually going on to work professionally in the textile industry for the following twenty years.

 

While I worked in the textile industry full time, I continued developing my career as a fine artist. During this time I was creating large scale multi-media paintings which involved silk-screening, chemical patinas, assemblage and painting. I sold artwork to corporations such as Pfizer and Signet Bank.  And I was also silk-screening on fabric, making award-winning, one-of-a-kind tableware.

I see my process evolving, with every stage leading forward to something new. In this way, my process acts like an open continuum. I don’t see myself as the type of artist who works exclusively in one medium: in fact, after working in the textile industry I transitioned to work as a graphic designer using contemporary technologies to create digital designs for marketing materials in the dance world. Through this evolution, I realized I’m the kind of artist who likes to explore and discover new things. I like applying an interdisciplinary approach to art-making, uniting the corporeal, metaphysical and psychological. I tend to experiment with unique elements and alternative processes, particularly if it’s something that hasn’t been done before. Once I innovate, I’m then ready to go on and explore what’s waiting to be uncovered. I just don’t like to repeat things because my impetus is to explore the unknown. My work exists at the boundaries of past tradition and new technology. 

ANTE. Your work draws from a deep, richly nuanced understanding of color combinations and color theory. How do you balance colors in your work? How do you see color as a key factor in how your artwork is experienced? 

MG. When I attended art school, color theory was rooted in a scientific approach. I recall choosing not to enroll in color theory classes because my approach to color is purely intuitive. I studied enough to understand complementary colors and the color wheel, and from there I was able to instinctively grasp color combinations.

After working in the fine arts industry, I transitioned to become a designer in the garment industry. There I developed my skill set and realized I excelled at selecting colors for fabrics. Eventually I transitioned to working in home furnishings as a colorist. I was in charge of painting several different color combinations in gouache paint to define different fabric “looks”, then going to the textile mills to oversee the printing of the selected color combinations. This was a very specific job which required a keen understanding in learning how to balance color. The colors that live with you in your home set a mood and reflect your taste, making color a key element affecting sales in this field. 

Great color combinations speak to people. They want to live with furnishings because the colors they’ve selected make them feel good and reflect their personality. I feel like color is experienced on a visceral level and can evoke certain emotions. I wonder in some sense if color evokes emotions similar to how music does, maybe on a subconscious level? It’s my hope that throughout my career in home furnishings that I helped set a tone of comfort and joy in a home.

Grant, Marion. Primordial Space (2014) 40″x40″
image courtesy the artist.

Through my spiritual development, I have learned how colors have profound spiritual implications and can greatly effect our vibrations and how others perceive us. Each chakra is represented by a color, and it’s helpful to have some understanding of energies and the colors representing them. For example, blue indigo is affiliated with an increase in peace, tranquility, and devotion. It is symbolic of the inner mind, intuition and the vast cosmic consciousness. It is also the color of the third eye chakra. To increase clarity of thought and intuition, it helps to meditate with indigo. Interestingly enough, I see my artwork innately incorporates some of these color meanings. One example is my fine art print “Primordial Space”, which is about meditating in a vast cosmic consciousness – an investigation of both inner and outer space.

Grant, Marion. Indigo Sky (2017) 22″x18″
alternative media on handmade translucent acrylic skin, image courtesy the artist.

ANTE. Can you walk us through how you approached your acrylic “skins” series found on your website under “Alternative Media”? When did this process enter your artistic practice, and how is it evolving over time?

MG. I began work on the acrylic skin series about six years ago. When I left the textile industry, I returned to Parsons in 1999 to take classes in new computer programs specific to design in order to build a wider skill set. Through these experiences, I began making art on the computer. My style of digital art involved combining portions of my previous artistic processes. This included painting, silk-screening and various chemical processes and patinas. After working and developing my digital art, I wanted to switch gears and to experience working with my hands again. I wanted more than just a flat surface in my artwork.

Around six years ago when this series began, I discovered two things simultaneously: first, was the book Digital Art Studio which was published in 2004 outlining how three artists combined digital art with traditional art materials. Secondly, I encountered the work of Catherine Steinmann on view at the Tibet House in New York. I saw her show “Vanishing Tibet” with artist Danny Conant. They were combining digital and traditional processes in photography to create mixed media artworks. I was very inspired when I encountered these works, which were printed on traditional handcrafted paper. I was so excited because I realized this was exactly what I wanted to do, and the spirituality present in the work also spoke to me. 

I subsequently discovered Mary Taylor’s work. Taylor was an assistant to a co-author of Digital Art Studio. I took Taylor’s class on working with digital and traditional materials and this launched me into experimenting with digital art and combining it with analog processes. This mainly resulted in using acrylic materials as I don’t like to use anything with chemicals or solvents if it can be avoided. I also happened to meet Catherine Steinmann in this class. We struck up a friendship, and I’m happy to have a peer to share this experimental approach to unusual processes and techniques with.

I started to develop my own process as a combination of digital art and handmade surface details. The process is labor-intensive, and many things can go wrong along the way, but it is exciting in its unpredictability. As a result, this process is continually changing and evolving. Putting the handmade surfaces through a printer is intimidating, as the sticky quality of the acrylic surface can ruin the extremely expensive printer I have to use in this process. These skins also possess a raw quality that in a sense makes them feel alive. They don’t have a stiffness to them, or feel overly polished: instead, they feel organic. This process is aided by layering iridescent paints and hand-embellishments with digital designs in between the different layers. 

Grant, Marion. Mother and Child (2013) 26×18″
alternative media on handmade acrylic skin, image courtesy the artist.

ANTE. Admirers of your work often appreciate its spiritual and soothing effect. What subject matter and concepts are you investigating in your work? Is it meant to be spiritual, and if so, how do you see this affecting your audience?

MG. My art is intrinsically connected to my spiritual identity. I’ve devoted my life to spirituality, creativity and transformation. Making art is my life’s purpose and serves as a visual meditation for me. I mindfully strive to create works that are uplifting, transformative and healing for the viewer.  My work introduces harmony and a sense of compassion to a wider audience, and my artistic practice reflects my spiritual development and vice versa.

I’ve been drawn to and inspired by Buddhist and Hindu imagery because it is so beautiful and soothing. That has been a big source of inspiration, especially for the prints on display in the “Fine Art Prints” Section of my website. I have met those who encountered statues of the Buddha, or viewed representations of supernatural deities, who reported feeling a strong, energetic presence. Through the years many people have recounted these transcendental experiences to me. I’ve been lucky enough to be a part of this phenomenon: once, I met a viewer of my work who described a powerful experience they had while viewing my fine art print at a Buddhist retreat. I felt overjoyed and humbled to be a part of this transformation in some small way. 

The series I’m currently working on is centered around the dragonfly, which serves as my spirit guide. I serendipitously discovered a dragonfly on the door outside of my building in Manhattan in May. This was a very unusual circumstance as Spring is not dragonfly season, and dragonflies are also not commonly found in urban spaces. The dragonfly is revered as a symbol for transformation and empowerment. It embodies creativity and light: reflecting the sun and bringing us out of illusion. Dragonflies encourage us to apply creativity and imagination to transform our lives and discover ourselves in new ways. The dragonfly appeared at a significant time in my life, and I appreciate its meaning and message for me. I hope that others can connect to uplifting messages that the dragonfly brings as well. 

While I don’t feel that people have to connect spiritually to my work, I do hope that my work positively impacts the viewer regardless of their own philosophy. I hope it enriches and uplifts others in their life’s journey.

Grant, Marion. Thousand Petals Gray (2009) 45″x43″, image courtesy the artist.

ANTE. You often incorporate nature and fabric patterns into your work. Do you see these motifs as contrasting or complementing one another? How do you create an interaction between the two throughout your practice?

MG. Contrast is a key element in my work. As long as I can remember, I’ve always combined geometric patterns with organic ones. This balance of subject matter persists throughout my practice, from painting to  collage and throughout my digital work. I see both contrasting and complementary elements at play in my compositions. For example, in my work “Blue Dragonfly“ the architectural draftsmanship in the background of the work juxtaposes with the delicate anatomy of a dragonfly’s wing. 

In the series Illuminated Miniatures on my website, the contrast lies between the organic, hand-painted watercolors and the textile patterns which are then overlaid in Photoshop. That series elicits a sense of being worn away: of layers being pulled apart and deteriorating as these contrasting elements are combined. In some of my works, iridescent paints between each layer unites the different overlapping layers of natural and man-made patterns. I often incorporate minimal elements, such as flat gray lines, that then create a sense of geometric contrast with the organic elements in the composition. Dorothy Krause, co-author of Digital Art Studio, unwittingly described my work when she wrote that the best digital art “combines the humblest of materials… with the latest in technology to evoke the past and herald the future.” It is this union of opposites, ranging from old to new, from geometric to organic, that creates transformation. 

Grant, Marion. detail image, Pink Brocade I. (2016) 10″x10″
transparent acrylic skin on wood panel, image courtesy the artist.

 

ANTE. You often layer objects and concepts in your work, both physically and metaphorically. What importance do you ascribe to layering in your practice as a whole? Do you see this as crucial to your creative process, why or why not?

MG. Layering is the most crucial element in my artistic practice. It acts as a key factor in my artistic expression, whether using computer programs to make artwork or creating work traditionally by hand. Layering allows me to combine different elements which may otherwise be disjointed, but when separated and re-arranged, allow a sense of complexity and depth. When finished hopefully this combination of imagery coalesces into a harmonious whole giving the work a new meaning. This is the essence of my work. 

It’s exciting to work in layers because you can’t really plan it. As a result, you’re never really sure what the end result will be. This method is perfect as it helps me discover new aspects of my process. I might plan a concept in advance, but then let the layering process lead me, allowing it to take over and guide me to unexpected results.

I am now seeing a similar pattern in my spiritual development, made evident by peeling away layers of personal development to reveal more truths underneath. Only after one layer is peeled away can the next layer underneath be worked on. It cannot be rushed. I never thought about this before, but I think it’s interesting to see how this compares to my process of making artwork.

The word “palimpsest” has been used to describe my practice, alluding to my practice of scraping and masking certain elements in an artwork in order to reveal others. By revealing traces of what is left behind, my work shows a worn quality, evoking a sense of history and alluding to mysteries of the past. 

ANTE. What new challenges are you looking forward to in your work? What new mediums are you anticipating working with and how would you like your practice to develop in new ways?

MG. Currently I have acrylic skins that I’ve made in a larger format than I’ve previously worked with. I want to print images onto them but I haven’t tried it yet. Printing onto large acrylic skins is challenging on my printer and can be risky. This is one reason why I’ve been working in a smaller scale until this point, but now I want to take on the challenge in this next phase of figuring out how to scale up. 

My work has also been developing toward working with multi-dimensional surfaces. I like the extra dimension as it brings out the reflective quality of the paints I use. As well as utilizing transparent and translucent surfaces, multiple layers in a work results in the image changing depending on how light hits the surface. This imbues the work with a sense of movement and helps to keep it from feeling static. It takes thought and experimentation to recognize how to best display my artwork, particularly when it comes to framing. The process is very different with each artwork. It can take time to find the best position and angle for artworks to hang onto the wall in order to truly capture the depth and shadows present in an artwork. It’s not the same as working with an opaque or rigid surface, because each work requires a different approach in order to enhance the work. 

With my artwork, the types of energy incorporated into each layer can change as the artwork builds. More layers mean a combination of energies can be present in each work, adding a feeling of depth and complexity.  This can almost be considered a type of alchemy in which an artwork transforms as layers are added. My hope is that this will lead me to explore new aspects of my practice I haven’t considered yet.  

Grant, Marion. Fairy Music (2018) 11″x11″
alternative media translucent collage, image courtesy the artist.